Dual quality of products

"Dual quality" of products can be defined as the marketing of goods with significantly different composition or characteristics, such as ingredients, as identical in different Member States.

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Parliament has long voiced its concerns about the dual quality of food. The EP stressed that discrimination between consumers is unacceptable in any form. In recent years, the concern that some branded products might be inferior in the Member States that have joined the European Union since 2004 has become ever more apparent. This concern has come to be known as the 'dual quality of products'. To address the issue, between 2018 and 2019, the European Commission's Joint Research Service (JRC) compared a set of branded food products sold under the same name and in the same or similar packaging across Member States. The analysis sought to determine whether, despite the identical or similar packaging, there were differences in product composition and, if so, whether those differences corresponded to any geographical pattern.

See more on this topic by visiting our package for the 8th parliamentary term.